alaudidae

Random link dump

Sun, 19 Jul 2009 05:46:01 GMT

There is a new restaurant by Kyle's place called "Angelina Pizza Bar"! It is a fancy pizza place with wine and an ice cream bar. Very excited to try it out: http://newyork.timeout.com/articles/restaurants-bars/76126/restaurant-openings-week-of-july-9-15-angelina-pizza-bar-andre-cowgirl-seahorse-lot-2-the-mott-sui-ren-izakaya

There is a roller derby movie. Yay roller derby: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8cA2ngjW0YQ&NR=1

Seeing Korean music videos make me miss the 90s and the days of NSync and Backstreet Boys. Remember when there were parties and there was always a group of guys who knew how to do the "Bye Bye Bye" dance? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_rYo8jXcesY

food and python

Thu, 15 Nov 2007 05:47:38 GMT

Today I learned that Stata sells tasty sandwiches, coke and fanta are a decent combination, and python does not love me like I think it did.

Also, the Somerville Sports Authority is pretty great and ZBT is wonderful for letting us borrow their hockey sticks.

All the cool kids have one...

Sun, 29 Apr 2007 23:47:42 GMT

Ooh. I hadn't seen a Snow Leopard before. ^_^

::wonders if/how it would change::

Because I was tagged by gnibbles...

Mon, 12 Mar 2007 08:32:01 GMT

"Once tagged by this entry, the assignment is to list 10 movies: your 5 Favourites & your 5 Guilty Pleasures. Then, pick 5 of your friends and tag them. No tag backs. This explanation should be included."

favorites: (about equal amounts of like, depending on mood)
1. Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind
2. Love, Actually
3. The Incredibles
4. The Devil Wears Prada
5. Serenity

guilty pleasures: (in order of increasing guilt)
1. Winged Migration
2. First Contact
3. Legally Blond
4. 10 Things I Hate About You
5. Harold and Kumar Go To White Castle (It's about friendship and the American Dream!)

While I like singing the song and mocking how ''the powers of the puma'' include things like flight, I can't in full conscience put the movie ''Pumaman'' down as a guilty pleasure. :P

I don't think I believe in tagging, but this is vaguely sort of fun...

Bicycles

Thu, 24 Aug 2006 01:56:02 GMT

So... I will be shipping my bike and have this feeling that it will want to be in a bike shop soon after.

Anyone know of any nice bike shops around ET or MIT? If they take bike shipments and can rebuild them, that would be awesome too :)

It had to happen

Wed, 05 Apr 2006 05:01:32 GMT

*poke poke*

Only slightly faking the time. Heh. Happy um... consecutive numbers day I guess :)

In Seattle

Thu, 09 Mar 2006 07:53:17 GMT

I can't seem to access my ATDP log from here for some reason.

Anyway, I wanted to repost a link to a pretty good essay about Doing What You Love that andreags posted.

I noticed later that the guy who wrote it, Paul Graham, also co-founded/wrote an essay about Viaweb. They made us all read the essay back in 6.001 as proof that LISP wasn't useless in industry.

I'm trying to decide whether his essay is more or less valid now that I know that he's financially wealthy.

The other interesting thing is that this is my second follow-random-links-on-the-internet excursion that ended up on Robert Morris's wikipedia entry. -_-; The internet is repeating itself. Or something. There's probably some sort of math proof in that :P

"If you think something's supposed to hurt, you're less likely to notice if you're doing it wrong. That about sums up my experience of graduate school." - Paul Graham

update

Wed, 22 Jun 2005 05:45:59 GMT

So. Term ended. I went to New York with people. I went home. My atdp log moved. John visited. And my laptop monitor died in a way that is not covered by my warrenty.

Real life is not particularly interesting. I miss MIT. I want my computer back to normal :(

6.003

Thu, 28 Apr 2005 18:34:20 GMT

Hm. I did most of my 6.003 pset last night in order to de-stress from thinking about 6.UAT. That was interesting. This particular pset is surprisingly doable though.

I refuse to feel guilty for working on the pset early. I want to learn to manage my own time better. Hopefully this is one step towards that.

Yay!

Mon, 28 Mar 2005 22:46:13 GMT

The 6.001 lab got new computers and flatscreen monitors. Much happiness ^_^

In other news, I think I finally converted from ie to mozilla firefox.

Also, it looks like I'm going to be in Palo Alto for the summer. Anyone know a good way to get housing around the southern end of Stanford? :P

Yay Christmas

Mon, 14 Feb 2005 01:38:52 GMT

Some MIT friends and I celebrated Christmas (in February) today. There was food, a gingerbread house, and gingerbread soda (among other edibles).

There were also lots of cute, most entertaining gifts.

I got a Ninja Turtles board game courtesy of sirlightblade, Psycobox, a U2 cd to add to my music collection (which is currently mostly musicals), a very LARGE wok, a nice fuzzy blue scarf, a pig shaped bead, scary socks, AND, this thing of wonderful cute coolness ^_^

The Picture:

The Plushie:

Hee hee. Apologies and thanks to Sam Brown. But yay ^_^

It feels good to have a comfortable get-together with friends. Back to work now...

Year of the Rooster

Wed, 09 Feb 2005 12:38:11 GMT

Ooh. It's Chinese New Year.

You know what would be great? Good Chinese food. And red bean cakes. Mmmm...

In other news, I am terribly day-shifted. I seem to fall asleep (whether I want to or not) around 1:30 am and then wake up around 7 am. Quite silly, really.

Spring Term, 2005

Tue, 01 Feb 2005 06:50:16 GMT

Hm. New term. I'm generally excited by new terms, but right now I just have this sense of foreboding and depression. Not having any sort of real sleep pattern doesn't help either.

Committments:
6.033
6.003
APO
6.UAT
7.05
6.001 LAing
21M.600

I'm having second thoughts about doing 6.UAT early though. I really have no idea what sort of project I want. But I also don't think I'd have any better sort of idea next term. But there was this generally depressing Course 6 Juniors meeting where people said you really should have a project by the start of UAT. Am I the only one who gets incredibly depressed after every interaction with Anne Hunter? Everyone else seems to be happier after talking to her...

Anyway, if I stick with UAT, I might drop 21M.600. And if I magically have extra time I might do LSC stuff. Katherine almost convinced me to blueform for Night, but I think I'll stick with my Projection Termpass :P

Music meme to break in my iPod

Mon, 03 Jan 2005 08:18:22 GMT

Taken from various people, including lakmiseiru

Instructions
Step 1: Get your playlist together, put it on random, and play
Step 2: Pick your favorite lines from the first 15 songs that play
Step 3: Post and let everyone you know guess from what song the lines originate
Step 4: Cross out the songs when someone guesses correctly (without the aid of a search engine or any stored electronic communication)

1 Si tu amor no merezco, no me ames, mas quédate otro día.

2 There's gotta be some life cleaner than this,/
There's gotta be some good reason to live.

3 ~~one seems to hear/ words of good cheer/ from everywhere/ filling the air~~ (struck by lakmiseiru)

4 ~~Her daddy wrestles alligators/ mama works on carburetors~~ (struck by ilai)

5 ~~graffiti decorations/ under a sky of dust/ a constant wave of tension/ on top of broken trust~~ (struck by baniszew)

6 how does it feel to know/ you never have to be alone

7 ~~God bless mother nature/ She's a single woman too/ She took on the heavens/ And she did what she had to do~~ (struck by unitarymatrix)

8 and when I close my eyes it's you I see

9 ~~Taking my sin, my cross, my shame/ Rising again I bless your name~~ (struck by rhean)

10 The love blooms at night/ in daylight it dies

11 I hear your heartbeat/ just go on for miles

12 ~~She went her way homeward/ With one star awake/ as the swans in the evening/ move over the lake~~ (struck by timeslayer)

13 Calm the storms that drench my eyes/ Dry the streams still flowing

14 ~~For you I bleed myself dry~~ (struck by timeslayer)

15 You may be stranded out in the cold/ Still you wouldn't change it for a sack of gold

Doo dee doo. Hum. Now my iPod seems to be playing choir-y things in latin.

New Year's Sleepover

Sun, 02 Jan 2005 12:32:36 GMT

For new year's, Cynthia, Jessica, Kim, Manda, Michelle, and I went to a sleepover at Cynthia's house.

Kingdom Hearts is an incredibly cool looking game. But now I have the Sephiroth song stuck in my head from the arena battle. So awesome looking. The sequel looks really pretty too. *sigh*

I'd write more, but I think Jess and Cynthia covered it pretty well. Clue was exciting, although I really thought Cynthia would take the game. *shrug* Yay beginner's luck? O:-)

I should write some sort of year-in-review thing. But I say that every year. And I'm pretty sure I forget every year. *shrug* I just want my old weblog back up so I can take a look at it. Hum.

But yeah. Break is relaxing. I have half a scarf done and have been spending quality time with my Fom and iPod. I have new glasses so I can see. Yay.

I also spent a lot of time with friends this break, which was great. Unfortunately, all of them are going back to school this week, so I'll be all by myself.

It's going to be strange having all this extra time at home. I'm afraid of becoming too relaxed and being unable to deal with term coming back. Ah well.

FVPdom

Thu, 18 Nov 2004 05:31:16 GMT

Wow. So according to Yoyo, I somehow got elected to be FVP next semester.

I have all these visions of "Fellowship... on Ice!" floating through my head. (Like "Service...with power tools...on ice!" but without the power tools). In any case, I'm really excited and just really, really, really hope I don't lame out as I have had a tendency to do in past semesters. Then again, I won't be taking a lab next semester (unlike my last two semesters) so maybe that will be happier. And having actual responsibility will hopefully make me more responsible.

I'm also wondering how much of what I think is actually a good idea and what is actually just fantasy and idealism. Broken down:

Ideal: Lunch in the office, every day or at least once a week
Reality: This depends a lot on scheduling. This term, I have a lunch break from noon to 1 every day. Last term, I had classes straight from 11 to 3 pm every day. People tend to come by whenever though. *shrug* But I do remember being pretty sad one time when I went to "lunch in the office" my pledge term and no one was there to let me in -_-;;

Ideal: Study break once a month
Reality: I actually think this is do-able. I mean, there are only 3.5 months and with Black Morbid and Pi Day, there's really only one or two more to think about :P

Ideal: Some sort of fellowship activity once a month
Reality: Brothers generally do (and should) go to service projects when they have a weekend free. There are service projects almost every weekend. It's hard to convince people to do two APO things in one weekend. *shrug* But a fellowship ice skating night would be cool. Although I'm not sure how many brothers are interested in ice skating. They should be though :P. Also, seeing as how I'm still sort of in charge of getting that foam screw done, I think a "paper-mache the big screw" fellowship event is in order. bwahaha. Mm... Maybe that could be a study break.

Ideal: PCs for big events (Steak Fry, SFF, um... maybe Chapter Weekends?) gotten near the start of term so that events can be organized and planned well ahead of time.
Reality: Heh. I need to ambush people while they are all relaxed and well rested during IAP. Unfortunately, I plan to be in Hong Kong for most of that time. Doh. I bet Hong Kong has internet. And where there's internet, there's zephyr :P

Ideal: General feeling of welcomeness and well-being in the office
Reality: I miss Mike Salib. He may still be around (I have no idea) but I don't see him much any more. But he used to be really cool to hang around with. Very relaxing person to talk to. Listened to problems and helped out and generally made things better. Luckily, there are lots of awesome brothers (and pledges!)still around who are likewise great to talk to. I just need to find a way to lure everyone into hanging out in the office more. Maybe I could team up with the Lounge Chair to think of stuff. So I guess this isn't really reality. I really have no plan for this. Ideas would be appreciated though :P

My main worries deal with manpower and delgation. While I was the Office Manager, I had a lot of trouble convincing people to come to office cleanings and usually had to twist the arms of people who were just hanging out in the office to help out. Hopefully convincing people to come to study breaks will be easier than convincing people to clean up the office :P I think I've also gotten better at poking specific people and such.

I guess we'll see...

Huh. Is it just me, or are mood icons disgustingly cute?

Edge of your seat election...

Tue, 02 Nov 2004 22:16:29 GMT

Waiting for election results was a lot easier back in 2000 when I was in California. And even then I was up until about 3 am Pacific Time.

*antsy*

It's worse than watching the Red Sox -_-;;

Go Kerry, go!

Huh.

Fri, 29 Oct 2004 14:35:16 GMT

Wow. The Red Sox actually won. Go them.

Now it's time to root for the Packers and that'll be my yearly dose of sports fandom. Go cheese! :P

huh

Sat, 16 Oct 2004 20:21:40 GMT

ATDP servers are being flaky again.

Yesterday I got sushi on Newbury St. with some friends. Good stuff and not as pricy as it could have been. Then we watched "Shrek 2". I liked the first one better. Sarah and I also went around campus and took pictures of some of the prettier trees.

I'm sort of feeling down right now, although I'm not sure why.

I get to project "The Birds" today. I hope I have a projectionist.

Cheers!

Fri, 10 Sep 2004 05:08:01 GMT

I do not understand why everyone suddenly seems to be using "Cheers" to sign off their e-mails.

I first came across the sign-off last term. My 6.170 professor always signed his e-mails with "Cheers!"... and usually after some sort of dreadful proclaimation in the aforementioned message.

And then, about halfway through the term, my TA started started using it in the same sort of situations.

Sarah, Lindy, and I used it for a short period with each other... mainly in a sarcastic bitter way. But we stopped.

But other people didn't. Suddenly, it seemed like every other e-mail I got had that word at the bottom.

In the last 24 hours, no less than seven e-mails have appeared in my inbox with that seemingly innocent statement.

Three of them are from TAs of classes I'm taking this term. And the rest are from organizations that have a significant claim on my time.

Yeah. This worries me. If 6.170 e-mails are any indication....

I guess "Cheers!" is a good way to say "yeah, I may or may not have dumped a load of suck into your life with the contents of this e-mail, but I still wish you the best, really".

I mean... at least it sounds... cheery

Huh.

Fri, 27 Aug 2004 03:35:48 GMT

It's not every day that a new president of MIT is elected. She has a young daughter and their backyard is next to senior haus. This will be interesting.

I went to the short introduction speech thing, stayed around for a bit of the reception, got cookies and brownies at APO, and helped out with various DME things.

After pappalardo closed, DME went to Good Times, this large arcade-like place with an amusement park ride, laser tag, and bumper cars. It's sort of like Chucky Cheese's, but with a bar in the back.

We had pizza, were given a large number of tokens, and told to have fun. That was really cool. Like a blast from childhood and such, but with more tokens and, more importantly, guilt free tokens. So I got to play a lot of stupid games I otherwise wouldn't have.

Like the plunger game... which I was surprisingly able to get 100 tickets from ^_^

And I got to play the hit-the-alligator game, which was as fun as I remember it being, although more painful on the hands than I remember.

Laser tag was also pretty cool (another blast from the past sort of thing) and the amusement park ride. I didn't play DDR there though :P

I wish I were getting more sleep. And that I had time to play piano. And finish the big foam screw for APO. Bah. I forgot to go by Next House today. *sigh*

Desk closing at midnight sucks.

John Mayer/Maroon 5 concert

Sat, 21 Aug 2004 04:56:26 GMT

was great.

In other news, there are frosh here now. It sort of scares me.

In other other news, I have decent results from lab for the second time this summer. Very exciting ^_^

Unfortunately, cramming extra work in in these few weeks before term means lots of extra hours over weekends and such.

Tentative schedule for term: 6.046, 6.003, 7.03, 14.12/14.41

Alternate schedule pending talking to bme people: 6.046, 6.034, BE.900J, 14.12/14.41, 7.03(?)

I like the looks of the second schedule more, mostly because taking all math classes (as per the first schedule) scares me. But I'm not sure that 6.034 BE.900J (7.03) < 6.003 7.03 in terms of effort.

The idea of 6.003 scares me too but the second schedule is pushing me more and more into VI-III land. Ah well. *twiddles fingers*

Summer's End

Fri, 13 Aug 2004 07:34:56 GMT

Today I bought a scheduler for Fall term and checked into my room at McCormick. Summers go by so quickly these days. Only one more guilt-free one left...

Fri, 30 Jul 2004 22:19:45 GMT

Jim might have drow pants... but I.... have a HOODED SWEATSHIRT. :P

Yay pictures ^_^

Saturday

Sun, 13 Jun 2004 07:01:36 GMT

Last day of conference. *shrug* Mostly stuff I've heard before. Talked with interesting grad students after the conference. Then I played tennis for the first time in over a year. Yay! But this means my leg muscles are going to hurt a lot tomorrow.

After that, a bunch of us went to the Pour House. Hooray for good, inexpensive food. Must remember to go back there sometime. After that we ended up in a math office talking about math for an hour. ick. No idea how that happened :P

Then we all went to the astrofield turf and played frisbee for awhile. Yay frisbee. But it was really windy so er... yeah.

Then I went back to my dorm, got my paper mail for the first time since I got here, and hung out with people for way too long. Now I am going to go to sleep so I can be in lab at 10 am tomorrow.

I haven't had this much activity in ages. But I'm going to have sore muscles and bruised hands tomorrow (frisbees hurt). Ah well. At least I feel healthy ^_^

*wonders why atdp logs seems to be down when I try to update, but then comes up again right afterwards...*